Harley Benton EX-76 Classic GHW AN

This was my second recent Harley Benton purchase and a more expensive guitar than my first, an HB35-plus Cherry, so my expectations of quality were higher and happily I was not disappointed. The guitar did not quite survive its shipping intact from Germany to UK despite being double boxed, but the damage will be easily remedied by a replacement pickup surround (which is on its way to me as I write this, thanks to customer services). I have a few constructive comments so I will get those out of the way first. So, the guitar arrived with a decent set-up and action but annoyingly HB do not seem to clean the frets/fretboard at all before shipping, so I would advise anyone purchasing one to also get some lemon oil cleaner to remedy this. I would also recommend replacing the cheap strings provided, as the high E doesn't take long to unwind at the tailpiece if you do a bit of bending. With this particular model being purchased unseen and having a natural wood grain finish, you are always at the mercy of the manufacturer on how good the wood grain matching is at the glued seams as the offset body consists of at least 2 pieces of wood glued together. The picture provided on the Thomann web site gives a good impression of how the wood grain was matched, however, rather annoyingly the matching is excellent on the back but not as good on the front and the grain is less pronounced than in the photos and not like the Mahogany I recognise. The fretboard on my model is also completely black (as shown on the cheaper EX-76 AN model) but not as shown for the GHW-AN model on the photos. One last comment is really specific to explorer shaped guitars in general. Do not expect to either wall hang it or easily find a guitar stand into which it fits due to the body shape and angled headstock! So that's the cons, there are many pro's though and it is still a very nice guitar for £350 (don't forget to add VAT and shipping/import costs to the price shown on the site if you are in the UK post-Brexit), with much better quality hardware than the cheaper HB models. Overall I am satisfied with it but to me it seems to be getting harder for HB to be seen as under-priced they move more up-market. Personally I think thinner neck profiles would improve the HB models playability greatly, but I guess that one is down to personal taste.

Was blown away by this guitar. It looks fantastic, the only blemishes on the finish are small and hidden on the sides and back. The fingerboard dye seems to leech to my fingers quickly, but I haven't noticed any change in the color, which is almost a pure black, unlike the pictures.
The quality of the tone is fantastic as well. The stock pickups aren't wildly amazing, but they do handle gain quite well, and the cleans sound nice, if not totally full. The instrument is very harmonically active, and gives feedback to the player. You won't impress other guitarists like if you bought a Gibson, but the sound is far, far closer than I would've expected.
The worst part was easily the nut. The tuning heads are very high quality, which makes the dirty, sloppy and poorly cut nut a little disappointing. The strings currently bind, and tuning stability is almost unusable. Fortunately, that is a cheap and easy fix, if a little annoying.
I'll happily buy another HB in the future. Being realistic, buying one of these nets you a guitar with no resell value, that likely will need work, but what you do get is absolutely fantastic.

The guitar is beautiful if you like explorer style guitars (I do!). The locking tuners are a nice surprise at this price point. Pickups sound decent, I still haven’t decided whether or not I will keep them. I am not crazy about the angled cable jack but it’s not a deal breaker by any means. The neck is not super chunky which is also very nice, at least for me. Frets seem nicely polished with no sharp ends. The 17th fret was a little high and needed to be tapped into place a little better. If I had any negative comment it’s that the action was set terribly high when I received it. I’ve been slowly adjusting the truss rod and action to get it more to my liking but it’s not there yet. The bridge seems kind of cheap and I will likely replace it. Intonation has been difficult to dial in with the B and G string saddles at full deflection. Overall I am pleased and will continue to dial it in to my liking.